Sex Matters: Why Men (and Women) Are The Way They Are

By Jed Diamond, PhD, LCSW

Like most creatures, I’ve always been interested in sex. I’m not just talking about the pleasures of carnal union, but also the very essence of what it means to be male and female. Did you know that there are 10 trillion cells in human body and every one of them is sex specific? Recalling what we learned in biology class, we all start out as a single cell and each cell has 23 sets of chromosomes. The first 22 pairs line up nicely and look similar. The last pair are called the sex chromosomes labeled X or Y. Females have two X chromosomes (XX), and males have an X and a Y chromosome (XY).

According to David C. Page, M.D., professor of biology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), every cell in our bodies carries either an XX chromosome or an XY chromosome. And these differences can be important. It has been said that our genomes are 99.9% identical from one person to the next. “It turns out that this assertion is correct,” says Dr. Page, “as long as the two individuals being compared are both men. It’s also correct if the two individuals being compared are both women. But the genetic difference between a man and a woman are 15 times greater than the genetic difference between two men or between two women.”

These differences can have an important impact on our health.  Marianne J. Legato, M.D, is the author of Eve’s Rib:  The New Science of Gender-Specific Medicine. “Everywhere we look, the two sexes are startlingly and unexpectedly different,” she says, “not only in their internal function but in the way they experience illness.”

For instance, it was long assumed that heart disease manifested the same in men and women. But it turns out the symptoms of a heart attack may be very different in men than in women. Men may experience the classic symptoms of chest pain that may radiate down the left arm. Women more often have symptoms including shortness of breath, nausea or vomiting, and back or jaw pain.

Another sex difference involves depression, which is very common in men and women. However, we now know that men and women often experience depression differently. This was personally important to me, since my father had tried to commit suicide when I was five years old. When I grew up and began research on sex and gender differences, I found that women are often sad when they are depressed, but men are often irritable and angry.

This was certainly true of my father. However, no one recognized that he was depressed until the suicide attempt. Though he survived physically, our lives were never the same. I believe that if people had recognized the symptoms of depression in my father, the suicide attempt might have been avoided.

The emerging field of gender-specific medicine can be of tremendous help to both men and women. I look forward to your questions and comments. If you are concerned about these issues or want to learn more, email me or follow me on Twitter.

Jed Diamond, PhD, LCSW, is the Founder and Director of the MenAlive, a health program that helps men live well throughout their lives. Though focused on men’s health, MenAlive is also for women who care about the health of the men in their lives. Diamond’s new book, Stress Relief for Men: How to Use the Revolutionary Tools of Energy Healing to Live Well, brings together the wisdom accumulated in 40 years helping more than 20,000 men, women, and children.